Shingeki no Bahamut: Genesis

Thousands of years ago, the ancient dragon Bahamut wrought havoc upon the land of Mistarcia, a world where both gods and demons live amongst mankind. Working together to prevent the world's destruction, the rival deities barely managed to seal Bahamut, agreeing to split the key between them so that the dragon would remain eternally imprisoned.

With the world safe from the destruction of Bahamut, it is business as usual for bounty hunters like Favaro Leone. Living a laid-back, self-serving lifestyle, the amoral Favaro goes about his work while on the run from fellow bounty hunter Kaisar Lidfard, a righteous man who swears vengeance upon Favaro. However, Favaro's carefree life is thrown into chaos when he meets Amira, a mysterious woman who holds half of the key to the world's fragile peace.

Shingeki no Bahamut: Genesis tells the story of a group of unlikely heroes who find themselves caught in the middle of an epic clash between gods and demons, forced to carve their own path in the face of the imminent storm.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Leone, Favaro Main

Yoshino, Hiroyuki Japanese

Amira Main

Shimizu, Risa Japanese

Rita Main

Sawashiro, Miyuki Japanese

Lidfard, Kaisar Main

Inoue, Gou Japanese

Azazel Supporting

Morita, Masakazu Japanese

Martinet Supporting

Tsuda, Kenjirou Japanese

Lucifer Supporting

Sakurai, Takahiro Japanese

d'Arc, Jeanne Supporting

Han, Megumi Japanese

Cerberus Supporting

Kitamura, Eri Japanese

Bahamut Supporting

Cook, Justin Producer

Ootsuka, Manabu Producer

Ueda, Yasuyuki Assistant Producer

Satou, Keiichi Director, Storyboard

Reviews

Dec 29, 2014

HelghastKillzone

Recommended

Shingeki no Bahamut: Genesis, by all accounts, should have been a completely forgettable and mediocre show having the pretense of being a teaser anime for Cygames and their mobile card game. The source material has the plot of a piece of cardboard and is little more than a collection of conceptual artwork. With all those things in mind, Studio MAPPA rises to the challenge and completely shatters my non-existent expectations as they set the standard for a promotional show.

Taking place within a fantasy setting where the combined efforts of mankind, gods and demons have successfully sealed away the world-destroying Bahamut, the world of ... Mistarcia enters into an era of peace. To insure that Bahamut would be forever encaged in its prison, the seal's key was split into two pieces and given to the gods and demons respectively. Two thousand years, a women named Amira manages to steal the gods' half of the key and that where the show chooses to kick off its epic adventure. Caught up in Amira's quest to reach the land of Helhelm are two bounty hunters with clashing sets of personalities and values.

The plot is simple enough and easy to follow but Shingeki no Bahamut: Genesis's strength lies in its brilliant execution and ever-escalating set pieces. Human, monsters, gods and demons of all different shapes and sizes come in for a battle royale that never fails to disappoint because the action is paced to be fast and furious which leaves little room for exposition. This actually works in the show's favor because it let the viewer's knowledge of other fantasy shows fill in the gaps instead of piling on explanations that would only get in the way. Fights takes place in varying degrees of captivating environments as the show overwhelm the viewers with its extravaganza displays. It does fall victim to losing momentum towards the middle portion as a dreaded recap episode shows up and the political maneuvering is less interesting than the hordes of monsters and soldiers duking it out with each other. Fortunately enough, it does manage to pick itself up to throws everything and everyone into speculate of the grand finale.

Characters

Having nothing but character illustrations as their starting point, the production staff MAPPA have crafted some very lovable characters that are all distinct in their attributes and eccentric personalities. It's not all about the action as the main characters are given fleshed out
backstorys and motivations rather than being Amria is actually a very strong demonic melee fighter capable of tearing apart much larger monsters with ease but acts very much like a child in spite of her terrifying power and outward appearance. She is quite endearing and the focal point of which the show drives itself.

Smitten by her looks and misguide notions, Kaisar Lidford is one the two bounty hunters accompanying Amria on her quest to reunite with her mother. A former knight that was disgraced, he still retains his code of honor in every fiber of his being and that extends to his fighting style, hair, and upkeep of his promises. He was overly the knight-in-shining-armor to a fault but I did warm up to him as the series went on as his character dynamics complement the other members of main cast.

This brings me to my two favorite characters of Favaro Leone and Rita. To start off, Favaro is nothing like your conventional hero as his goal in life is to loudly indulge in life's guilty pleasures of women, money and booze while. As a red-headed bounty hunter, he is selfish, crass and utterly underhanded when it comes to fighting while wielding a revolver crossbow.

How awesome is that?

Equally fabulous is Rita, who joins up with the main cast a little further down the story. She may look like loli bait but never adheres to the stereotypical template that her appearance suggested. Her character interactions and contributions made the show that much more enjoyable on top of what was already offered.

There is a myriad of other supporting characters from all the different race who don't really get or need character development but make the most of their limited screentime in just being plain awesome. Some standouts include Jeanne D'Arc of the humans, Bacchus, a god who manages the bounty system and Azazel of the demon faction.

Visuals

Animated by the Studio MAPPA, the very same team who created Kids on the Slope and Zankyou no Terror, the amount of quality put into this series places it among the best looking shows of the 2014 fall season. Drawing inspiration from Western fantasy aesthetics, the art style is atypical of the standard Japanese anime look and has that classic Dungeons and Dragons vibe to it. The attention to detail to the various locales and props really help immerse the audience into the world of Rage of Bahamut: Genesis and that not even mentioning the stellar cinematography which lends itself to be more of a Hollywood film than standard anime show. There are small amounts of 3DCGI and for the most part, it looks all right as it doesn't distracts from the pretty 2D visuals.

Sound

Yoshihiro Ike, who scored the soundtrack to Ergo Proxy and Tiger and Bunny, comes in with a full orchestra and choir to deliver something that didn't really live up to the epic action on the screen. His work, by all means, was well-composed and of high quality but I couldn't help but feel that the music was rather uninspired and lack the punch to bring the show to the next level. More specifically, it may be due to the lack of variety when it comes to just relying on strings and vocal as I found hard to recall anything memorable. Perhaps, if he had used more instruments in his ensemble, it would be an given the visuals the accompaniment and energy it deserves. In contrast, the opening credits, "EXiSTENCE” performed by SiM, was one of my favorites of the fall season with it rock music and awkward Engrish. It does what every opening should do and that is to be extremely metal and awesome in priming the viewers for each weekly installment.

Game Adaption

If Studio MAPPA had the goal of making me try out whatever they were advertising for,

they succeeded.

Shingeki no Bahamut: Genesis was amazing enough that I simply wanted more and what better way to do so than to download the game it's based off of. However, upon seeing the chunky dated interface, confusing bland gameplay and obvious microtransactions, I promptly deleted it off my machine. I'm grateful that aspects of the trading card game were integrated quite well in the framework of the show of which was the bounty system and I never felt it was overbearing or obnoxious. It was just a small reminder of what the show's roots are and just how vastly difference they are in terms of quality.

Conclusion

Coming completely out of the left field, Shingeki no Bahamut: Genesis is the surprise hit of the 2014 fall season. I simply cannot give enough praise to Studio MAPPA for their creativity and talent in creating a show that defies all expectations. There were a few small things that held it back from being a masterpiece, but nevertheless it was still one hell of a ride.

Final Score: 8.5/10

Reviewer’s Rating: 8

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Jan 16, 2015

kaizersaber

Mixed Feelings

"Which way does the wind blow? To tomorrow!"

Shingeki no Bahamut is a pre-apocalyptic show about fate, destiny and what it means to change your fate, thrown into a cast of very unique characters and a power struggle between angels, humans and demons. The show is very promising from the beginning, builds up a lot of excitement in the middle, but ultimately ends in a rather anti-climactic fashion with insufficient resolution.

TL;DR
Story: 5/10
Art: 7/10
Sound: 5/10
Character: 7/10
Enjoyment: 6/10
... Overall: 6/10

Good points:
+ Very unique character and setting designs
+ Good and varied main and supporting cast
+ Exciting and interesting from the beginning
+ Good plot twist towards the end, though it may be obvious
+ Some good comic moments

Bad points:
- Very underdeveloped antagonist characters
- Fails to have a good resolution
- Anti-climactic climax at the end of the anime
- Many plot holes left unexplained
- Lack of development in supporting characters

Story: 5/10

I'm going to tackle this plot analysis in a slightly different manner and instead of focusing on key plot arcs, I'm going to structure this on the various plot merits. The story itself is rather simple. Two bounty hunters and childhood friends, Favaro an Kaisar are at odds with each other. By chance or fate, Favaro meets Amira, a half-demon half-angel, who has just stolen the God Key and received instructions to go to Helheim. Favaro then promises to help Amira to bring her to Helheim but himself doesn't know a thing about where Helheim is or whether it actually exists.

1. Ingenuity / Interest

The story starts off with the main conflict right from the beginning. Constantly, we are being reminded that everything that the protagonists are trying to do, is to stop Bahamut's impending revival after the God Key was stolen. This same old story of imminent doom is repeated over and over again, as if the audience was too forgetful to remember how deadly Bahamut actually is. (+1 for overarching conflict)

Bahamut was in fact, so deadly, that most of the cities managed to rebuild themselves sufficiently within the next 6 months, which is much shorter than it took Haiti to recover from the 2010 earthquake, and Sri Lanka to recover from the 2004 Boxing Day Tsunami. Clearly, Bahamut does less damage in 15 minutes than natural disasters can do in mere seconds. So, not that big of a deal actually.

The anime did do a good job of attempting to fool the audience into thinking that Bahamut was very powerful though. There were numerous scenes throughout the anime, and in almost every episode, of the angels in heaven creating a barrier made up of tessellated hexagons, struggling to keep Bahamut's pre-awakening power in check. The angels constantly make remarks like, "We can't keep this up... at this rate, we won't last..." Archangel Michael even once says, "If this is the power of Bahamut before he awakens, then how much more when he actually does?"

The old "the world is coming to an end" overarching conflict is not an original one unfortunately, so the story gets no points for that. Also, as far as plot is concerned, I was never really very excited about seeing Bahamut in action, neither was I very concerned about whether or not he would revive in the first place - because by half of the anime and due to all the constant reminders of Bahamut's terrifying power, it was obvious that he was going to revive anyway, and then get beaten by a random hero anyway.

2. Depth / Development

In this case, the story didn't offer much depth behind it at all. While Favaro's random musings about what his father said was interesting, all his talk about fate and changing your fate just sounded very cliched and fell on deaf ears. There was nothing remotely thematic about the rest of the story.

Also, the story was so simple that they really stuck to the classic protagonist and antagonist stereotype. The main antagonist, Martinet, the ultimate manipulator's, real motives were basically to watch the world get destroyed, which is a very shallow explanation of his evil schemes. The protagonists on the other hand, simply want to do the opposite - prevent the world from getting destroyed, and nothing much else. It lacked a lot of complexity and depth in this area.

The only plot development came in the form of the forced suspense at finding out who the real mastermind behind Amira's stealing of the God Key was. And I say forced because they basically used the same old "masked figure" who goes about doing obviously evil stuff in Anatae but they intentionally don't show us his face just because they want to keep us asking who it is. But this is repeated so many times that we're no longer interested to find out, or, the more perceptive would already know that this was Lavalley. So again, very limited plot development beyond the main plot line. (+1 for a little development)

There was one good plot twist though, that Martinet was actually Lavalley, even if it was already hinted much earlier in the Anatae arc, when Lavalley first secretly meets Amira out of sight of everyone else, suggesting that Lavalley was actually a bad guy in disguise. Also, the anime tried not to make it too obvious, by making Lavalley fabricate a fake back story for Amira, as well as making him look like he was trying to stop Jeanne D' Arc's burning at the stake. (+1 for plot twist)

3. Coherence / Logical Sense

There are a whole host of plot holes in this story, but at least the main assumptions of the story are believable - that there are 2 parts of a key that awakens Bahamut when they fuse together, and that it is prophesied that a hero would be able to stop Bahamut, that there exists angels, demons and humans and that Amira could be born of both demon and angel (+1 for believable assumptions)

The way the plot progressed also at least made some sense, and there were no super obvious flaws in the way the main conflict was presented and dealt with. Plot lines also progressed smoothly without any major anomalies. (+1 for making some sense)

Unfortunately, there were many instances where Kaisar reacted very unbelievably and unnaturally, even given his characterization as a narrow-minded person who is greatly affected by everyone around him. From things like crying for Rita, to being over-protective of Amira, to trying to kill Favaro numerous times without even bothering to clarify what happened, to suddenly become super cooperative with Favaro.

Bonus Points: Not awarded due to 9 plot holes.

In episode 1, Favaro and Kaisar are pictured on horseback, jumping off a bridge and falling 15 times their own height through the air (roughly 27 metres) before the horses landed on uneven roof tile surfaces. There is no possible way that this stunt could be performed without inflicting some serious injury on both the horses and the rider, and it is definite that the horses wouldn't be able to continue galloping on top of houses either.

In episode 3, Kaisar cries over Rita's zombified body when she turns into a zombie after being bitten by one of her own undead units, but Kaisar literally just met Rita in this episode, and it's quite far a stretch to say that Kaisar has any feelings for the young girl at this point in time. All he really did was tell Rita about his backstory and have Rita tell him how pathetic the story sounded.

In episode 4, Kaisar has only just met Amira, but suddenly wants to "protect" and "save" her for no real apparent reason, other than the fact that she is a girl. Kaisar seems to have this weird inclination to protect any girl that he meets, doesn't he? Or maybe that's part of his characterization as a noble knight, but it still doesn't make sense whatsoever.

In episode 5, Azazel claims that the New Orleans' Knights were lying in ambush for his demon ship in Sword Valley, but in the show it clearly shows most of the knights on horseback, holding their flag and emblem high in plain sight - it was clearly a direct confrontation rather than an ambush. It's not possible that Azazel's scouts only managed to catch sight of the entire army after they were attacked, since most of Sword Valley's terrain is flat and there is no terrain cover whatsoever.

In episode 6, the three archangels, Michael, Raphael and Uriel, decide that letting the humans take care of Amira, who is currently also sought after by the demons, is a lot better than personally sending angels down to guard Amira themselves. I don't believe the angels lacked manpower since in the last episode, they clearly still had tons of reinforcements and sparing a few to look after Amira would have been a much better idea.

In episode 11, archangel Michael somehow realizes that the small little unnoticeable purple ball that Rita threw at Jeanne, which bounced off a flying duck, was the antidote for Jeanne's demon transformation, and decides to give up his own life to turn Jeanne back to normal. There is no way, that Michael would be noticing a small ball in an aerial combat situation between Jeanne and Bacchus, also there is absolutely no way Michael can deduce even remotely that this ball is an antidote that works on Jeanne.

Episode 12, Favaro decides that cutting Kaisar's forearm off to fool Martinet into thinking that he was still under his control, and then using the bounty hunter tool on Kaisar's arm to capture Martinet, was a better option than having Kaisar simply use the tool himself. All Kaisar needed was just for Favaro to block Martinet's view of Kaisar for long enough for him to suddenly shoot out the wristband in Martinet's direction and say the commands. It was unnecessary drama and in Rita's words, "Letting your arm get chopped off, that's stupid."

Also, if all Favaro did was to stab a Barb of Bahamut onto Bahamut's head, then honestly couldn't any random flying angel or demon do it? All they had to do was pass Favaro's barb to any flying ally and it was a done deal. From the angels' point of view, it seems like it was a lot more difficult trying to defend against an awakening Bahamut than an already awakened one.

Plus, if we look back at Martinet's plan closely, we can see a key plot hole resurface at the start of the anime. If Martinet's plan was really to get Amira to steal the God Key and then have her bring it to Helheim, why did he simply leave Amira wandering around herself, trying to find a way to get to Helheim? Shouldn't Martinet have at least given Amira the other half of the pendant so that she could find her way, from the beginning, rather than have some random, unreliable bounty hunter clumsily try to help her find the way there? Martinet made pretty much no effort on his own to positively ensure that Amira would end up and find herself in Helheim, he just basically somehow believed that Favaro would magically lead her there.

Overall the plot suffers in every department - it lacks a whole lot of depth, it isn't particularly interesting or exciting, it's poorly developed and it also suffers from a great host of plot holes. Unfortunately for this 13-episode anime, they couldn't really pull off the plot well enough.

Art: 7/10

OP Sequence: 2/2
ED Sequence: 0/2
Animation: 2/3
Aesthetics: 3/3

The OP Sequence was very well crafted and was beautiful, but I really didn't like the artistic style for the ED Sequence. On the aesthetics side, I loved the character and setting designs that this anime used - really quite unique styles - from Favaro's afro to Kaisar's weird hairstyle to Bacchus and his drunk look and Rita, the kawaii zombie girl, was really a joy to watch. The animation side suffers just slightly a little because I thought Bahamut himself was quite poorly animated and made him a lot less threatening than it could have been. He continued to seem frozen in stone because Bahamut never moved anywhere away from his original location.

Sound: 5/10

OP Sequence: 1/2
ED Sequence: 0/2
Background Music: 4/4
Additional Themes: 0/2

The OP Sequence sounds good at first, but after awhile gets really jarring and I kept skipping it after that. The ED Sequence was basically as boring as the animation they put for it. Background music was good though, with a good mix of both eerie and action-packed music. I also liked how they used a lot of vocal orchestra in this - keeping to the Bahamut's "ancient" theme. No points for additional themes though, because there were none.

Character: 7/10

The main characters are Favaro, Kaisar, Amira and Rita in that order for the protagonists, and Martinet and Beelzebub in that order for the antagonists. The rest of the cast - Bacchus, Hamsa, Jeanne, Azazel, Michael are supporting characters.

Favaro definitely is one of the most unique characters I have ever come across. More than just having a weird afro, his constant switching between serious to playful, his style of not wanting to do more than he should, yet knowing that he will regret it, and his general ability to joke around even in the most direst of situations really make you want to love him. You can tell he also changes slightly - from going to simply being happy go lucky to actually taking responsibility for his actions and for Amira, whom he learns to really take care of, like a younger sister (+1 to uniqueness, +1 to growth) His backstory though is kind of insufficient, since we really don't know what exactly happened when his dad and the bandits attacked Kaisar's dad.

Kaisar as a character actually falls short of almost anything. He's a cliched noble knight who fails at doing everything precisely because he keeps trying to uphold these noble values without being able think straight and to make reasonable judgements about the situation. He's also fairly useless in the entire anime - his only use being to save Favaro from the demon-state of mind at the end - because besides that he does nothing but get in Favaro's way and is a complete burden to Rita, who can do much better without him. Even while protecting Amira he gets caught together with her and gets locked up in a cage where he could do nothing. Still, at the end he finally learns to put aside his differences with Favaro and managed to, as a team, defeat Martinet in an overly dramatic manner (+1 for growth). His backstory was as insufficient as Favaro's, since they basically share the same backstory, but at least his "childhood friend" link to Favaro shed more light into his interactions with Favaro and explains how he both wants and doesn't want to kill him (+1 for character interactions).

Amira is also a rather interesting character, with superhuman powers of transforming into a one-winged demon and basically just brutally punching her enemies down. She's also later on revealed to be young, in fact, so young that she technically qualifies as a little kid in spite of her looks. The plot tell us that demons made her age faster using the cocoon, so that her body develops faster and is several years older than her mind. That's not a bad explanation, but it basically robs Amira of any characterization whatsoever. She becomes a complete and total pawn in this anime, used by Martinet, used by Favaro, used by everyone else essentially, and has hardly any views, opinions of her own, and merely gets told what to do. While she does have an awesome transformation ability, the fact that the anime only made her out to be childish really diminished her role in the plot.

Rita is by far my favourite character in this anime, and also one of the characters that was better developed than the rest. Rita is a young girl who turns a necromancer after discovering a book, and then uses her powers of reanimating the dead to "play village". Apparently she's played village for at least 15 years already and is basically getting sick of it. She eventually runs into Kaisar and Favaro and after failing to kill them, turns into a zombie and starts following Kaisar around. Her visibly nonchalant-looking character and blunt remarks are well-weaved into her "more mature than she looks" archetype. If Amira is the girl who looks older than her age, then Rita is the opposite, a girl who looks much younger than her age, but of course, a more mature character is a lot better for main character types. Rita manages to not only become useful in every situation using a reanimation ability - saving them from soldiers, putting up distractions - but also manages to uncover Martinet's concoction and, as a somewhat professional herbalist, manages to create an antidote that counters it. What's not to love about this adorable little child whose only goal is to save her friends? Even though she's acts rather coldly and cruelly to Kaisar, she shows that she really does care for him, even helping to bandage up the stump of an arm he has left at the end. (+1 for cute amazing character, +1 for multi-faceted nature)

As for the rest of the supporting cast, they were also a host of very interestingly conceptualized characters. Bacchus, the self-proclaimed god, who basically only drinks a lot and pays bounty hunters whenever they get a bounty, and his amazing duck Hamsa who is more than just a little pet, but proves to be able to fly and deflect projectiles by expanding his body. There's also Jeanne D'Arc, who is awesome sword fighter capable of wielding a huge-ass sword that can unleash such a devastating blast that it forces Azazel to retreat. Jeanne also sees some character development in the form of her righteous, unwavering nature when she was tempted to take the concoction. Unfortunately, once she turns evil in the later episodes, even after Michael's sacrifice to restore her normalcy, she ceases any further usefulness in the plot whatsoever. (+1 for interesting, varied cast) And of course, there's Azazel, who did nothing but get ambushed and took his revenge on Beelzebub. He's not very developed either.

On the antagonist's side, we have the one-dimensional Beelzebub who is so stupid that he doesn't even know that he can't control Bahamut even if he bestows upon it the Transcendent Key that he made. Beelzebub basically is a power-hungry monster but ends up getting, and deservedly, brutally incinerated by one of Bahamut's blasts. He's so poorly developed that I can't even consider him a character.

Martinet is just slightly more interesting because he's the one doing all the ground work, making sure his evil schemes fall into place, manipulating an angel from long ago, the demon working with him, and various other humans including Jeanne, Favaro, Anatae's King to make his plans go smoothly. But still, not a word is said about his character or backstory, and his motives for plotting all this evil is even worse - "I just want to watch the world get destroyed." Way to go, another crazy apocalyptic lunatic.

For characters, the anime suffers quite a bit from poor character depth and development for a lot of the cast, including main characters, and the antagonists are just so poorly developed that they were basically ignored this entire time. Still, the uniqueness of many of the characters really pulled through and made me enjoy watching the characters interact with one another.

Enjoyment: 6/10

For humour, the anime has done quite well. There is a lot of slapstick on the part of Favaro and Kaisar, who get into trouble plenty of times and have to have their fellow allies save them. Bacchus and Hamsa are also a pretty comic duo, because both have very peculiar sneezes. Also, Rita's monotonous and blunt remarks at all the stupid situations just make me laugh a lot more. (+2 for comedy)

In terms of action, the anime also doesn't fail to deliver. While there isn't a lot of actual action and fighting scenes per se, there was a decent amount of close combat fighting, sword fighting, all of which were rather well animated and was exciting enough to keep me watching. (+1 for action)

There were also some hints of emotion in the anime, especially at the part where Amira finally gets to meet her own mother, but in very dire circumstances. Still, she presses on stubbornly to give her a hug, and at the end says that Favaro was right that her mom would recognize her just from the hugging alone. Her kiss with Favaro was slightly unnerving though but at least it gave their relationship a good finishing touch. (+1 for emotion)

Pacing-wise, the anime was pretty exciting from the beginning, and really set the mood of being an action-comedy flick, as well as introduced our two very interesting important characters of the show. (+1 for pacing) Towards the middle though, as the story slowly progressed and we slowly started to see who was the evil mastermind behind the entire evil plot, things got a lot less interesting as things became obvious and I honestly just wanted to skip to the part where Bahamut awakens. And finally, at the end when he finally does, the resolution was just super anti-climactic, I never even go to know what happened to Rita or the other supporting characters, I only ever saw Favaro and Kaisar.

This anime has at least earned itself 1 bonus point for not having any filler episodes (not counting the recap episode 6.5, even though it's useless).

While I did enjoy most of this anime, there were honestly some parts where it did feel repetitive and got a bit too boring for my liking.

Overall: 6/10

Altogether, I thought that the plot could have seriously had more thought put into it, while the characters Kaisar and Amira really need a lot more character development as part of the main character cast. It was a fairly enjoyable watch, though I was admittedly disappointed after reading some really rave reviews about this show.

Reviewer’s Rating: 6

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Jan 10, 2015

Markezzo

Not Recommended

Shingeki no Bahamut is a series that I don't seem to love as much as others, which I will explain in detail while trying not to spoil too much.

First of all, the music and art is great, presenting the show in a spectacular package. Even the occasional CGI monsters works for the most part, sticking out yet without looking lazy.

I was drawn in by the idea of bounty-hunting and the refreshing design of our swashbuckling main character, Favaro, who brings in just the right balance of charm and goofiness. The conflicting relationships he shares with everyone around him is also an unending spring of entertainment. ...

The first episodes present an interesting concept. After bragging at a bar, Favaro unwittingly tricks a demon-girl and gets into a contract with her. Our suave rogue is now stuck with a demon far stronger than himself, who could easily destroy him with the flick of a finger if she realized he lied to her. It had great potential for some mind-games, with Favaro constantly having to lie and outsmart the demon in order to survive.

Sadly this is where the characters start to show how underdeveloped they are. The demon-girl turns out to be a naïve girl, easily outsmarted by everyone, turning into a plot-device and a damsel in distress. The promise of a great character-dynamic between her and Favaro goes straight out the window. My biggest pet-peeve however is that Favaro suffers from an old shounen-trait, which is that he’s too cool to care about anything. Is Favaro cool? Sure. Does having no clear motivation make him cooler? Not really. If anything it just makes him look like a third wheel when he's dragged into situations against his will. He even states out loud that he doesn't know exactly why he's doing what he's doing. He says he wants to rebel against destiny and forge his own path, yet his motto is “the wind blows to tomorrow”, symbolizing just how much he's guided by wherever the wind blows him. In a nut-shell this is what made the characters a let-down for me.

The story is a mish-mash of ideas that I’ve already seen done better. The great personification of evil that’s about to be awakened after a thousand years. The bickering trio from Samurai Champloo. The literal retelling of Jeanne d’Arc’s legend with the added twist at the end.

The story has several problems, but one is far bigger than the others. Our title-character Bahamut is not even remotely involved with the main characters until the last third of the series. The angels, demons and Jean d’Arc however are involved with Bahamut early on. I felt like the actual main characters were left to aimlessly wander while the main plot developed in the background.

Overall it is a well-animated series with an underdeveloped story that never delivers on what could have been something far greater.

Reviewer’s Rating: 4

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	Poll: i hate the main character ( the male ) houssam-salmi - May 17, 2015	31 replies	by Jureidini »» Jul 27, 2:26 PM
	Poll: Shingeki no Bahamut: Genesis Episode 12 Discussion ( 1 2 3 4 5 ... Last Page ) HelghastKillzone - Dec 29, 2014	392 replies	by butaniumbc »» May 29, 8:41 AM
	About the game sandwich-boy - Dec 27, 2023	3 replies	by Animaticide »» Dec 27, 2023 12:46 PM
	Figuring out gods, angels, and demons Fukoku - Aug 28, 2023	0 replies	by Fukoku »» Aug 28, 2023 2:10 PM
	Poll: Shingeki no Bahamut: Genesis Episode 6 Discussion ( 1 2 3 4 ) Stark700 - Nov 10, 2014	157 replies	by johndeerdrew »» Feb 3, 2023 11:48 PM

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